An Independent Presidential aspirant has said poor management of peak time energy loads is responsible for Ghana’s intermittent power cuts. 

Prior to Marricke Kofi Gane’s comments on Joy FM’s Supper Moning Show [SMS] Tuesday, experts had pined the power crises to an inability of the government to fuel power generating plants. 

Speaking on the SMS Monday, the Executive Director of the African Centre for Energy Policy [ACEP], Benjamin Boakye said the government is struggling to find money to buy fuel to power plants and generate electricity.  “We don’t have fuel” Ben Boakye declared. 

Ghana has close to 4,420MW installed capacity (made up of plants and dams) - nearly a 100% more than it needs – the country needs only 2,500 megawatts at peak hours to power homes or businesses.

But Kofi Gane doubts that. According to him, power rationing should not have lasted this long if it were a simple case of fueling generators. 

He posited that the solution lies in evenly distributing loads by drawing balance for domestic usage in the night and those of the factories in the day. 

“Manufacturing companies should be shifting the manufacturing into areas of the day that can balance out for those who need it at night,” he said.   

Gane said it is difficult to blame the current challenge on the Power Distribution Service [PDS], the company that recently took over from the Electricity Company of Ghana, given that it is merely managing the inefficacies it inherited.

According to him, the PDS will require some time to implement its long term programmes aimed at addressing the energy sector challenges.

However, he faulted the PDS for its failure to announce a timetable to help power consumers regulate their power usage for both domestic and work purposes. “Such nondisclosures amount to disrespect of the consumers,” he said

Marricke Kofi Gane has announced his bid to run for president in the upcoming 2020 elections and is expected to run against President Akufo-Addo (NPP) and NDC flagbearer and former president John Mahama.

The chartered accountant, an international development practitioner who is an author with 11 books to his credit, in a recent statement announcing his presidential bid, said his experiences in working with different governments across the world has better placed him to addressed Ghana’s problems which lie in equipping, motivating and directing the youth.